


Never Get Involved in a Land War in Asia

by NiceCoasters



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, short scenes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-30
Updated: 2016-09-30
Packaged: 2018-08-18 15:43:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8167268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NiceCoasters/pseuds/NiceCoasters
Summary: A series of classic blunders.





	

It was a little bit past midnight, drifting off to sleep when Alexei was struck by inspiration. He rolled out of bed and rummaged through his nightstand for a pen and paper. Then, finding only a chewed on ballpoint and some napkins that were more like wax paper, ran to his kitchen junk drawer, scrambling to find something before the words left his head.

He had been trying to divert his cyclical thoughts about the loss and had wound up stuck in another, much more pleasant loop, of all the different things he could call Snowy. Pet names that Snowy didn't really understand, this one, a few private endearments, our goalie (ours), public insults that were clearly meant as endearments, a brief foray into variations on his given name, my goalie (mine), and the reassuring rhythm of Snowy, Snow, Snow, Snow, Snow. All the sounds he could ascribe to him wound together like a song he wanted to keep in his heart. But he was already starting to lose the beat.

Triumphantly, Alexei pulled a crumpled legal pad from the back of the drawer. He sat straight down on the kitchen floor and began to scratch down the sounds that had been rolling through his head. A few lines in he realized it may have been easier to just type this up on his phone, but no, that didn't seem right. Phones were for schedules and grocery lists, poetry was something for paper. Alexei was no poet, had written absurdities when forced to write poems in school, but he had to admit that this was forming into something like a poem. He laughed quietly to himself, scratching out a line when something better came to him, at the strangeness of what had started as harmless (hopeless) flirting ended with him jumping out of bed in the middle of the night to write a love poem.

He read it over before collapsing back into bed. He thought it wasn't too bad, no masterpiece, but there were a few neat bits of imagery and he felt he kept the sense of rhythm that had driven him out of bed in the first place. Most importantly, he decided while throwing the neatly folded paper on top of his bag, the feelings were true. Snowy would chirp him about it but, if Alexei knew him, it would also make him happy.

Half way through practice Alexei realized the flaw in his sweet romantic gesture. The poem was in Russian.

He took the anger from himself and put it on the ice. His teammates remembered how their opponents could be scared of this potato.

Snowy called out to him in the locker room, "Hey, asshole, what the fuck is up with you today?"

Alexei needed to talk to him privately, "I'm starving, get me food."

"God, Alexei, you're a black hole. We'll go to the corner diner."

The diner was quiet, a few old men at the counter and Alexei and Snowy in a corner booth. Alexei tried to judge the viability of just never mentioning the poem and living with his silent shame, or maybe translating it into English? But, no. Alexei knew more English than most people assumed, but not nearly enough to rhyme or construct a metaphor. It seemed best to keep it to himself, except now he had to either make up a fake reason for him to be upset (stupid) or pretend he hadn't been moping in the first place (more stupid).

"So, are you going to tell me why you were on a rampage today, or do you not want to talk about it?" Snowy asked, after they'd ordered.

There! An exit, but then he looked at Snowy's worried face and realized it wasn't really an exit at all, since it would lead to Snowy thinking something awful had happened that made Alexei suffer in silence. In the end, it was just a silly piece of paper.

Alexei studied the speckles on the table, "I wrote you a poem."

"You did?" Snowy sounded genuinely shocked, "Was it bad? Are you upset because you wrote me a dumb poem, Jesus Tater..."

"I am a man of many depths, Snow," Alexei responded, mock serious, "But not that bad, just very Russian."

Snowy looked at him in confusion for a second, "I like "very Russian" things. Wait... is it depressing? Do I die in the end? Did you fucking kill me off?!"

Alexei's gasping laugh makes the waitress glance over, but she quickly goes back to talking with her coworker.

"You stay alive. It's just... It's in Russian, snow. I woke up like this!" He mimes sitting bolt upright, hands reaching from his head to show enlightenment, "And wrote you my feelings and thought, "He will make fun, but be happy too," and then I bring to practice and the thing is in Russian." He spoke very fast, and he's not sure he got all the words right, but Snowy gets his meaning more often than not.

For some reason Snowy has stopped laughing and Alexei is nervous. 

"You wrote me a poem. In the middle of the night. In Russian," Snowy says quietly, and it takes Alexei a moment to see it, but he's also got a quiet little smile.

"You still have it right? You didn't burn it or some emo shit like that?"

"Yes, still have." He hadn't even wanted to look at it again. Who forgets that the person they're writing a poem for won't even be able to read it.

"I want it," says Snowy.

"Like I said, is not even..."

"Tater, Alexei, babe," Snowy grabs his hand and looks him in the eye, "You wrote me a poem, and I don't fucking care if I can't read it, I want my poem. 'Cause you were thinking of me at midnight and decided it was a good time to write romantic poetry. It could be in Klingon, I don't care, I want it."

Alexei sighs, trying to hide an overwhelming wave of emotion with exasperation, and digs through his bag for the little piece of notebook paper.

"Here, does not even look nice."

Snowy unfolds it, looking over it even though he doesn't even know a single symbol of Cyrillic.

"What does it say?" He asks eventually.

"Just things, names. You have lot of names and they are all good," No, Alexei thinks, it's nothing like that. This is why he wrote it in Russian in the first place. He gathers his thoughts and tries again, "I call you many things, but they are all beautiful, but they all mean you."

Snowy looks at him, then at the poem again, and Alexei prepares himself for the teasing, has a few chirps at the ready that, while not actually good chirps at all, he thinks will make Snowy laugh.

Snowy just looks at him and says, "I'm having this framed."

**Author's Note:**

> I am but a tired cheese-monger writing about tough dudes and feelings of the romantical persuasion.
> 
> If you think this needs more/different tags or edits let me knoooooow~~
> 
> I honestly was just trying to come up with ship names, but decided they were all dumb, but that I don't want the burden of carrying alone. If I ever actually write another chapter it will be Intentional Scarcity.
> 
> Do you know any Snowy/Tater ship names? Please tell me, I can't call these poor boys Snater.


End file.
